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political assistants' pay
Political Assistants' Pay
Added 14 August 2006
Over the past couple of years a number of ads have appeared on our Jobs page advertising Political Assistant posts - based in Local Authority Departments.
This prompted a former political assistant to contact W4MP with some useful background information on these jobs. Several MPs' Staff have moved on to political assistant jobs so we hope any of you contemplating such a move will find this guide useful.
A
Guide to Political Assistants’ Pay and the Implications for Political
Staff
The
True Value of Political Work
Political Assistants
were introduced in 1989 as part of the Local Government and Housing Act.
The maximum salary threshold at the time was SCP44 approximately £13,500.
This was the same salary threshold for determining politically restricted
posts.
However, over the
last decade Political Assistants salaries have been frozen at about £25,044.
Imagine the uproar if MPs salaries had been frozen for such a long period.
In fact, I am not aware of any other British worker who has had their
salary frozen for such a long period.
The
Current Position based on Statutory Instrument No 1509
Statutory Instrument
No 1509 Local Government,
The amount specified
for the purposes of section 9(3) of the Local Government and Housing Act
1989 (assistants for political groups) is £34,986.
Section 9 of the
Local Government and Housing Act 1989 provides that each relevant
authority can appoint up to three persons to provide assistance to members
of political groups in the authority. Their pay is subject to a ceiling
set by the Secretary of State.
Policy
background
Each of the three
largest political groups on a relevant authority (subject to the third
largest having at least 10% of the members of the authority) is entitled
to have one political assistant. The general role of political assistants
is to undertake research and provide administrative support for political
groups. Political assistants are local government employees and, with two
exceptions, the regime restricting the political activities of local
government employees applies to them. The two exceptions enable them to
speak to the public with the intention of affecting support for a
political party and to publish or cause to be published written work or
other material intended to affect public support for a political party.
The Order provides
for an increase in the pay limit that local authorities may pay to
political assistants. Like the 1995 Order, the limit is aligned with the
salary rate at which political restrictions start to apply to officers
generally in local authorities (spinal column point 44 of the salary
scales for local government officers incorporated in the National Joint
Council’s Scheme). The limit has fallen significantly behind spinal
column point 44 threshold and it is therefore considered appropriate to
give local authorities the power to increase pay to this threshold if they
judge that this is necessary.
The
Implications for Political Staff
Already some local
authorities are responding positively and raising the salaries of
political assistants. There is currently, mutual beneficial cross
movement of political staff between Westminster
and local authorities, improving the political knowledge and skills of
both national and local government. Improvements in the pay of local
government political staff should make it easier to obtain improvements in
the pay of Westminster’s political staff, if Westminster
is to compete for the best political staff. A general rise in
political staff’s pay will enable the political sector to compete more
effectively with other sectors such as the media, advertising,
consultants, law and finance for the best graduates.
Why
should our democracy be valued any less?
Ian
Scott
August 2006
Ian
Scott was previously a local government Political Assistant and is now a
local government Scrutiny Officer. In his role as a UNISON
representative he represents political assistants and is keen to achieve
pay justice for them.
Over
the last 5 years Ian has been campaigning for the lifting of political
restrictions for council staff below chief officers as he believes the
current restrictions are unnecessarily infringing officers’ human rights
to freedom of expression. The Government is currently reviewing
political restrictions with the objective of achieving a more reasonable
and sensible solution which balances the need for protecting human rights
whilst ensuring objective advice from local government officers.
For
more information: Ref: Hansard 10 March 2004.
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